Family fun
Wellesley celebrates with annual Apple Butter and Cheese Festival
WELLESLEY — Chloe Saunders is only nine years old but she mounted the mechanical bull at the Wellesley Apple Butter Festival Saturday afternoon like a pro.
One jump from the floor, swinging her long legs over the bull’s back and she was firmly in the saddle. For a few minutes anyway, then the bull bucked and twisted and eventually the fourth grader tumbled to the floor. Actually she bounced off the floor. Everything except the bull is inflated.
“It’s slippery,” said Saunders, who had accepted the challenge of riding the bull at the Wellesley Apple Butter & Cheese Festival, Saturday afternoon. The kid loves to ride, preferring horses however, and she will be taking the sport more seriously in the future.
The Sir Adam Beck public school student was at the fair with her mom, Denise Saunders and grandpa, Eddie Price of Kitchener, a self-professed “baby” meaning he loves the kiddie things in life, the fairs, the games, the fun and so the family comes along, too.
His only complaint?
“We had to stand in line for an hour to get an apple fritter,” he said. “It was gone in two minutes.”
The annual one-day festival takes place in this little town on the last Saturday in September and people from around the region and further afield pore into the downtown core which is mostly blocked off.
Smiling firefighters from the volunteer fire department are in charge of directing traffic and parking. It seemed everyone in town was involved: churches, service clubs and various organizations all had volunteers out.
It requires a huge community effort to host such a large festival, one that was started in 1976 by the board of trade as a way to attract visitors. And that it does, with an estimated 35,000 to 40,000 visitors. This year, the numbers were down somewhat bringing the visitors totals to between 25,000 and 30,000.
No wonder they come. The festival starts with a pancake breakfast and throughout the day it offers children’s amusements such as traditional rides but also a climbing wall for the mountain goats in your family and then there is that mechanical bull tossing kiddies to the floor one after the other. Luckily, everything is soft and squishy so the only injuries are to egos and feelings.
Sarah and Matt Ronanick and their two year old daughter, Callie, came from Waterloo to the festival for the first time.
“It sounded like fun,” said Sarah. “Callie loves apples and the weather was beautiful.”
The couple do attend a lot of festivals in Waterloo Region, particularly Elmira’s Maple Syrup Festival in March. Highlights of the Wellesley festival for the family was the food.
“It’s a fun outing and fun experience for Callie,” said Sarah, noting nap time wasn’t an issue because her little one refuses to sleep on the weekends, hating to miss any action.
The young family was also interested in the children’s entertainment, such as singer Erick Traplin who performed in the morning.
Eddie Price said he loved the music too, particularly the bands but then there was all that delicious, aromatic food: sausage on buns, apple cider, locally made cheese, fresh cut fries and entire turkey drumsticks covered in a paper napkin to keep the drips to a minimum.
The festival also featured farm tours, antique tractor displays, puppet shows, clog dancing, an Idol music competition, minitractor pulls, the list was exhaustive and all profits from the festival are used for projects within the town, everything from building playgrounds to beautifying the downtown.
In the past they have raised as much as $30,000.
For visitors like Price, outdoor festivals are good for the soul.
“I’m old, it helps to keep me young,” he said with a grin.